University of Kentucky standout John Rhodes prepares the same way for each baseball game.
Well before digging into the batter's box, the former Chattanooga Christian standout who was one of the top freshmen in the Southeastern Conference this year is mentally preparing himself to put the opposing pitcher at a disadvantage.
"I start with 23 swings off the tee, 20 off front toss and then I take 23 swings on the field low effort," Rhodes said. "Then I come back in and take another round off the fastball machine, change into my jersey and take three final swings off the tee before the game starts."
Following that routine has provided consistency for Rhodes, who said he hunts fastballs early in counts and is able to predict what pitch he thinks is coming the deeper the count goes, allowing him to be more selective.
"John's success starts with his brain," Kentucky coach Nick Mingione said. "It's really good. He truly understands how to hit and what he is trying to do, and he goes out and executes it. He has a great plan and routine and never shows up to the cage just blindly hitting."
With a simple and compact swing, the 6-foot, 200-pound Rhodes found quick success with the Wildcats this season and worked his way from hitting ninth in the lineup to second while taking over the regular starting position in left field.
In 16 games, the right-handed Rhodes batted .426 (26-for-61) with 10 doubles, a triple and a highlight-reel walk-off home run to defeat Murray State on March 4. He led all SEC freshmen in batting average, hits, on-base percentage (.485), doubles and total bases (63), with his slugging percentage (.672) second.
He was tied for second in the country in doubles and was one off the team lead with 19 RBIs when the season ended due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The NCAA announced on March 12 that its remaining winter and spring championships would not be held, and five days later the SEC determined its regular-season and conference championship events for the remainder of the 2019-20 school year were off as well.
Rhodes went 3-for-5 and drove in three runs in the Wildcats' final game of the season, a 10-4 win against Western Kentucky on March 10 that pushed their record to 11-6. Kentucky was set to open SEC play three days later with a weekend series at Vanderbilt.
While there will be no more baseball this spring for Rhodes and the Wildcats, he made a big impression in a small amount of time.
"In our program we talk about the student, the person and the player. John Rhodes is just exceptional in every one of those," Mingione said. "He made a 4.0 GPA his first semester, and as a person he is a joy to be around. The players love him, and he is an ultimate competitor."
Mingione has extensive experience as an SEC baseball coach, having worked as an assistant at Mississippi State from 2009 to 2016 before taking over the next season at Kentucky, where he was an assistant in 2006-07. He was named the league's coach of the year in that 2017 debut campaign that ended in an NCAA super regional.
The Wildcats went from 43-23 that year to 34-22 in 2018 to 26-29 last spring, but Rhodes could be a major part of a turnaround when the team returns to the field.
"John is already a great player and has all the makings to be a superstar one day," Mingione said. "Now, how he handles failure, that's going to be a huge part of how high his ceiling really is. He has experienced a lot of success so far, so the way he manages and works through some failure will be key. There is no doubt in my mind he will handle that well when that time comes."
Rhodes' immediate impact at Kentucky comes as no surprise to Brandon Turner, a former All-American and All-SEC player at Mississippi State who was drafted by Major League Baseball's Marlins in 2008. Turner is the owner of eXposure Baseball, a select program for which Rhodes played.
"I think anybody who knew him when he was a kid would have said he was a freak athlete," Turner said of Rhodes, who holds the Chattanooga Christian track and field program's record in the long jump at nearly 22 feet.
"He was born with a lot of gifts, but at the same time he has multiplied them because of how much time and effort he has put into the game. He gets the most out of his ability and has a really bright future."
With the season over and Kentucky having moved to online instruction for the remainder of the semester, Rhodes has returned to Chattanooga, where he continues to build off a routine. He hits twice a day, throws a couple times a week and even has picked up doing yoga once a week on top of his workouts and runs.
"I just love getting better," said Rhodes, who hit .560 with 12 home runs and stole 17 bases in his final high school season while leading the Chargers to the state playoffs. "From a young age I fell in love with the process, and I think that allowed me to grow my love for the game. Every time I step on the field, I want to feel like I am the hardest-working guy out there.
"My dream has always been to play baseball for a living. Having that goal in the back of my mind allows me to keep pushing myself to be better every day."
Contact Patrick MacCoon at pmaccoon@timesfreepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @PMacCoon.